New California law will change the internet forever as ‘digital fingerprints’ added See more of our coverage in your search results. Add The California Post on Google California is putting a digital leash on AI fakes. A landmark new state law taking effect this week will require artificial intelligence companies to add invisible “digital fingerprints” to AI-generated images, videos and audio, giving users a way to determine whether the content they’re seeing was made by a human — or a machine. Written by Bay Area lawmakers, it will require AI companies to embed difficult-to-remove data known as “provenance” into their creations, allowing people to check a file’s origins through content verification tools. The goal is to make the internet a little less of a Wild West. “While AI has some benefits, we’ve seen AI content used for election misinformation for scams and abusive deepfakes,” state Sen. Josh Becker, D-Menlo Park, recently told KQED. The concern comes as AI-generated political content has already begun making waves in The Golden State. As previously reported by The Post, two California Democrats recently urged Congress to crack down on AI-generated campaign ads that could impersonate candidates or political organizations as the technology becomes increasingly sophisticated. US Sen. Adam Schiff and Rep. Ro Khanna (D-Fremont) are pushing a new crackdown that would stop fake candidate impersonations from hijacking federal campaigns. The push came after California political campaigns embraced AI-generated ads. This included Republican gubernatorial candidate Steve Hilton’s videos attacking Gov. Gavin Newsom, former Vice President Kamala Harris and Democratic nominee Xavier Becerra — as well as former Los Angeles mayoral candidate Spencer Pratt’s viral “Pratt Man” campaign video, which racked up millions of views with a Hollywood-style AI parody. Schiff warned that AI-fueled political deception crosses party lines. “AI-generated fraudulent advertising which uses the likeness